


Cause and Effect

by Inkribbon796



Series: Masks and Maladies [125]
Category: Markiplier TV (Web Series), Who Killed Markiplier? (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, And maybe Ethan, Angst, Cute dog boy is the only unharmed character, Death, Gen, Magically tampering with the bounds of reality, Self-Harm, Soul Death, Vomit, superhero au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-06
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-18 05:06:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29238045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inkribbon796/pseuds/Inkribbon796
Summary: Fate is but a fickle thing.Seeing the lives in hand and deciding what to bring.A web spun with lives and lies.And in the end, takes their eyes.
Series: Masks and Maladies [125]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1538131
Comments: 9
Kudos: 14





	1. An Eye for an Eye

**Author's Note:**

> For the Author’s and the Host’s birthdays. The Host’s first appearance was April’s 1st, but in my fics I just have their birthdays on the same day.  
> Originally I just planned it to be the Host’s origin, but it turned into King’s as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNINGS: warnings for vomitting black sludge and seizing  
> For the Author’s and the Host’s birthdays. The Host’s first appearance was April’s 1st, but in my fics I just have their birthdays on the same day.  
> Originally I just planned it to be the Host’s origin, but it turned into King’s as well.  
> 

~::~ Two Years Ago ~::~

Life is all about choice and consequences. There had been a long string of dominos that had been set up years in advance.

A lonely boy being taken in. Being coddled and scolded in equal measure. Being exposed to dark magic and powers beyond his comprehension.

But today one boy had been slow to get up, quick to get himself a coffee at his favorite coffee shop.

If he had waited ten minutes his more angry brother would have been in another room and the coffee, proof that he had been elsewhere would have been gone.

Anger would have been chilled, a life saved . . . And the city, doomed in the process.

Arthur was starting to get older, he was eighteen. Legal for many things, but not for others.

Today one of those should have been leaving the base on his own. But no, he had to get into a fight with some of the heroes, and then one of those apprentices had to die.

Not that the young author cared about that. He didn’t really care about a whole lot of people. It hadn’t even been his fault, he hadn’t even been in the building where it had happened.

It just frustrated him, being cooped up in Dark’s main office with Kay. Kay was being quiet in the corner and stopped being fun to bother several hours ago. Dark was at his desk.

The Author was bored, so painfully bored that it hurt.

And then Illinois, who hadn’t left with them when Dark originally went to work, walked in.

For Arthur the worst part was that he was carrying a coffee with him. “South side’s looking good.”

“Good,” Dark commented, without looking up from his papers. “One less thing to worry about.”

“Where have you been?” The Author demanded heatedly.

“Out,” Illinois commented.

Kay also looked frustrated, but unlike Author he didn’t have the temper to do something about it.

“What the fuck!” Arthur shouted in fury. “Why do you get to leave and the rest of us are stuck here?”

“Maybe because I don’t start fights with the heroes,” Illinois answered smugly, taking another long sip of his coffee as he maintained eye contact with his adopted brother.

That had Arthur downright furious. He could hear the blood pounding in his ears. He was so angry he missed Dark scolding Illinois for verbally poking at his older brother.

Arthur looked down to glare at his notebook, Dark’s warnings drilled into his head. But he glanced up to see Illinois with a hand braced on Dark’s desk and a smug smile on his face as he was looking at the Entity.

Dark wasn’t looking at him, too busy doing whatever paperwork he was occupied with to look at him.

But that didn’t matter to Arthur. The young author had always been jealous of the easy bond between Illinois and Dark. There seemed to be nothing Illinois could do that would truly disappoint the Entity. Meanwhile there was nothing Artie did that made Dark happy with him.

Furious, Arthur wrote in his black notebook: _“Illinois breaks his leg.”_

Nothing.

Arthur could feel another aura pushing his back. Illinois’s luck was guarding him.

_“Illinois breaks his leg.”_

_“His leg snaps into a thousand pieces.”_

_“Illinois breaks his leg.”_

_“Illinois breaks his leg.”_

_“Illy breaks his leg.”_

_“Illinois breaks his leg.”_

_“Illinois breaks his leg.”_

Then Arthur _felt_ Illinois’s luck give in and he heard a blood curdling scream come from Illinois and his legs collapsed. On the way down his face collided hard with Dark’s desk and he broke his nose and his pinky finger.

Dark looked up immediately when Illinois screamed but wasn’t fast enough to catch him. He saw that Illinois’s leg was clearly broken. Immediately he sent Arthur and Kay home and rushed Illinois to the hospital.

Making his second mistake of the day. His first was not bringing Illinois with Arthur and Kay. The second was not sending Arthur to his cool down room.

“That fucking asshole!” Arthur cursed, kicking a stool over, screaming at it.

“What—” Kay started before flinching back.

“He thinks he’s so fucking cool because he’s Dark’s favorite, I bet if I was his favorite then Illy couldn’t get away with shit!”

“Good luck with that,” Kay scoffed bravely.

“Come on, I need a witness,” Arthur ordered.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Kay told him.

The young Author grabbed Kay by his tie, yanking him forward, “I fucking snapped Illy’s leg, don’t fuck with me Kay.”

Kaylor’s eyes widened in terror, “You what?”

“I’ve been snooping around Dark’s office and he’s been looking for someone. I bring that asshole to Dark and I’m the favorite.”

“I don’t think—” Kay started.

Arthur didn’t listen, already writing: _“Arthur and Kay find Dark’s mortal enemy”_ and in a disorientating second the two teens weren’t in the Manor anymore, there were in some back alley. He had a huge smile on his face as he closed his notebook. “I’m going to take his fucking head and Dark’ll love me.”

At that moment a man was shoved out of a bar by a burly looking man.

“Stay out!” The man shouted.

“Hey,” the man said with a slurred, drunk tone, “now wait a second.”

The door violently closed in his face and the drunk man picked himself up. Kay was struck by how much like Dark he looked like. Just looking at him made him nervous.

Hiding behind Arthur, Kay actually took the time to study the man. The two boys were unaware of the creature in front of them who shook his head and slapped his face a couple times and was suddenly, inexplicably, sober.

Then the Actor realized that there were two teenagers in the alleyway with him. “Oh hey, you two looking for an autograph?”

“No, we’re looking for your head,” Author announced dramatically as he smiled in sadistic glee. He immediately went. _“The Actor dies and his head rolls to the floor.”_

Marc just stood there, uncertain what was going on until he felt something curl around his throat. It tickled.

And so the Actor laughed, a laugh that became more deliberate when the Author kept trying, figuring that if persistence had gotten Illinois’s leg then it could get this man too.

“Are trying to kill me?” Marc chuckled, taking his hand and batting away the wisps of the Author’s aura. “Isn’t that cute? And you two are? No wait, I’ll get the script.”

The Actor snapped his fingers and held his hand out expectantly.

A small light tan hand appeared from nowhere, hit the Actor over the head with a white folder and then disappeared.

“Owww,” Actor frowned, catching the folder in time and rubbing the top of his head. “What was that for?”

He didn’t receive an answer.

“Alrighty then,” Actor rolled his eyes and flipped over the folder. “What even is this script, don’t they know who I am?”

Author tried to throw a knife at him but the Actor’s aura just slapped it out of the air and it clattered to the ground uselessly.

The young man clutched his notebook a little tighter.

“Kay and Arthur,” Marc started reading, “ _blah, blah, blah,_ wait hold the phone. Are you Damien’s kids? I thought that uptight fucker couldn’t even have those.”

There was a twisted smile on his face as he clapped the folder closed, cackling to himself. “Okay, okay, I have my motivation now. Rolling.”

Actor looked at them expectantly, motioning with his hand. Then he cleared his throat, “We’re rolling, your line.”

“My what?” Author asked, unsure if he was furious or feeling something like fear.

“Amateurs,” Marc scoffed. “You’d think that Damien would at least let you read your scripts before he sent you out here.”

The anger burned a little brighter than his fear, “I wasn’t sent by anyone. I’m here to take your head and bring it back to the Old Man.”

The question: _“Who’s Damien?”_ burned in Kay’s mind but he didn’t get to ask it.

“That is so adorable and funny,” the Actor snickered. “Come on, give us the real line. I know you’re trying for some clever, dramatic improv. But leave that to the real professionals.”

Then, under his breath, he muttered, “I swear it’s like working with Wil sometimes.”

“I am not playing with you, I am going to kill you and bring you head back to Dark,” Author promised.

“You’re really close,” Marc groaned, holding out the folder. “Do us all a favor, kid, and leave the improv to the professionals. Here, just read through your lines again and you can hit your mark and we’ll run it again from the top.”

“I—” Author barked before swiping the folder out of the Actor’s hand.

He opened it and started flipping through it.

“We’re on page 10,” Actor told him, popping a breath mint into his mouth, a bottle of water in his hand.

But Arthur didn’t hear that, he could only hear the sound of his blood rushing in his ears. The folder contained not only the conversation with the Actor, but Arthur breaking Illinois’s leg before in the warehouse.

And something in the young man, felt like it was threatening to break under the strain.

“I didn’t write this,” Author commented, as if his brain was trying to keep from being pulled into a gaping abyss.

The Actor just chuckled at that, “ _You?_ You think you’re this story’s actual writer? Don’t make me laugh. Ink’s got all the keys to this little bubble. You’re just a two bit side-character in the greatest triumph between the greatest hero ever born and the surliest devil that Hell can provide.”

“My powers are to alter reality from my writing,” Author spat.

Actor scoffed, “You’ve sure got some crazy powers, but you can’t alter this storyline, so read your lines, and we’ll get this scene done. So I can go back to my green room, get myself some nice wine, and sleep.”

Author threw the folder on the ground and spat at it, “I’m not some second fiddle, I run this show.”

Rolling his eyes, the Actor checked his watch, “Come on, don’t be a diva ‘cause you aren’t the main character. Just say your lines and we can get your scene over with, and then you and your friend can fuck off to whatever thing you do offscreen.”

Author felt like there was something vile bubbling up in his throat. His chest burned, his eyes were throbbing with an intense pain.

When he could speak it bubbled out as, “Get the fuck away!”

And suddenly all three people in the alleyway were gone, the Actor dumped in some dive bar, and Arthur and Kay were thrown into a different alleyway.

The first thing Kay did was throw up. He felt like his stomach was tying itself into knots.

Arthur was laying on the ground, he felt like there was something inside of him trying to burn itself out of him through his throat.

The Author was choking, barely able to get enough air. There were black spots in his vision from a lack of air but also from something else. He could _see_ things. But not from his eyes. There was the alleyway and the grey sky above him, but then there were other things.

A dark room with someone pressed up to the side of him, the feel of a book in his hands. A voice that was as familiar as his own.

Two familiar voices arguing about something that someone named _Chase_ was doing.

He was backed up against the corner of a room, book in hand, bumps underneath his fingertips. Kay was talking to some people and he felt happy.

“Artie!” Kay’s voice shook him back into consciousness and he took in a big gulp of air. The sudden rush of oxygen made his head swim.

Then whatever was trapped in his throat seemed to get unplugged, and he started vomiting up black inky sludge.

Kay had to turn his head so he wouldn’t choke. The young man felt so dazed and scared, like his head was half in a fog. Dark’s enemies frequently lied, that was the nature of working in the network. But whatever he’d done to Arthur was worse.

And he was panicking so bad that he didn’t know what to do. He immediately reached for the little star he kept pinned to his coat but found that black ink clinging to it and he shuttered. Trying to get Dark’s attention did nothing. There was something, someone in-between the Entity and his children.

Looking around desperately, Kay saw a dog nosing around. Whether is was a stray or had just gotten away from its owner, Kay didn’t know and honestly it was inconsequential.

Because Kay loved animals, and he knew that dogs got help when their owner was in trouble.

Quickly Kay pulled out some creamy peanut butter snacks he had in his pocket from his lunch. He made a little whistle and held out his hands.

The dog looked at him, one of his slightly floppy black ears perking up as he looked at him, tilting his head.

“Hey boy, _wshshsh,_ if I give you this will you go get help? Please?” Kay begged, crying.

The dog took the food and walked away, and all Kay could do was hope.

Jackie was out on patrol with Ethan and Silver. The mood somber with the loss of Robbie — even if Marvin had brought him back from the dead — and the first big change was that apprentices had to be watched at all times.

Even if Ethan was no longer a minor, no one wanted to take any chances.

The hero and apprentice saw a mini Aussie run out of an alleyway, and look around for a bit before the dog raced over to the two heroes, wagging his tail and barking, jumping around a bit.

“I think he wants to play?” Ethan smiled, hands bracing his hands on his knees.

It took a little bit for the heroes to realize the dog was trying to lead them somewhere. It took them a bit longer to follow it.

Silver, because he was flying saw what was wrong first.

There were Kay and Arthur, the latter had started seizing which was freaking Kay out even more. There was that inky vomit all over both of them by this point. The dog barked once and Kay looked over in relief.

A relief that turned to fear when the young man realized who had been brought to him.

But Artie looked like he was dying, and Kay was overcome by panic. He couldn’t contact Dark.

“Please,” Kay begged the heroes, unaware that Jackie had already contacted the paramedics as he approached slowly.

Jackie did his best to help keep Arthur alive until the paramedic showed up. Arthur was allowed into the ambulance and without anyone noticing in the panic the dog Kay had called to him jumped in. Jackie shadowing the ambulance.

Behind the group, the black ink that had been in the alleyway began to quickly evaporate, as if it had never been there in the first place.

In a half-an-hour’s time Dark would follow Arthur’s trail blindly into the alleyway. He’d been running around like a madman trying to find them since their trackers seemingly vanished.

Anti was hot on his heels, “How the fook did yeh loose ‘em? I thought yah wired them?”[1]

“I know,” Dark said, his voice almost had a panicked tone to them.

“How the hell did they get from the house ta[2] here?” Anti’s tone had the same tone to it.

“I don’t know,” Dark was relieved to finally catch their auras, to his supernatural senses they stood out like neon lights on a dark background. But there was something wrong with Arthur’s aura, like something had been done to it.

And in the alleyway he caught the faintest traces of an aura: Jackie.

“Jackie was here,” a rage began building in Dark’s twin souls.

“That fooker[3]!” Anti snapped. “If those bastards touched ‘em, I’ll snap their necks an’ feed ‘em ta hellhounds.”[4]

Dark found that for once he completely agreed with Anti. The two demons quickly contacted Google, who was already combing through the city’s camera footage and was more than happy to have some actual direction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The hand that hits the Actor is mine. Look, he 100% deserves it. He’s a hard character to deal with.
> 
> Accessibility Translations  
> 1\. How the fuck did you loose them? I thought you had them tracked?  
> 2\. to  
> 3\. fucker  
> 4\. If those bastards touched them, I’ll snap their necks and feed them to hellhounds.


	2. The Blind Seer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Host is born and Kay decides what he wants to do with his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNINGS for self harm and eye scratching and technically death. He flatlines but his body does get back up.

When the Author finally woke up everything felt a thousand times worse. He just knew things.

Like the fact that Dark was looking for him. That he had hurt Illinois for just existing. He had threatened King with the same.

. . . . . .

__ _ Who the fuck was King?! _

He knew King. He was his adopted brother. An animal lover who was a better person than he could ever hope to be.

But whoever the hell that was, the Host couldn’t remember . . .

And the instant that name, the Host, entered his mind he became aware that he was not alone in his own mind.

It was a chilling realization. As if walking into his bedroom and finding someone who looked just like you sleeping in your own bed.

Thousands of images entered his mind completely unprompted. He could see the off-white ceiling of the hospital room. But there were also an image of him meeting with Dark again. Dark who had worried about him, and was angry. The discussion played out in a thousand different ways. In many Dark cried and hugged him, telling the Author how much he loved him and missed him. In some they argued violently until the Author struck out first.

On and on it went until it moved to a new scene. Him and Kay talking in the hospital lobby. His brother was afraid of him.

The images kept coming and there was no stopping them. It overstimulated his brain due to the two sets of contrasting optical feedback.

He couldn’t take it, it was going to drive him insane.

In his coming madness he reached for his eyes.

“Hey, hey,” his doctor cautioned, still in the room and startled at the Author — the Host’s — screams.

He looked at Doctor . . . Dr. Iplier.

__ _ A heroes’ doctor. _ His mind supplied.  _ Smart, sardonic, and the most patient person the Host would ever meet. _

It would also be the first and only time the Host would get to see the man’s face, the Author reached up. Before Dr. Iplier could manage to stop him, the Author in a bout of strength he never had felt before, started viciously clawing at his own eyes. His hands started to irreparably damage his eyes, scratching and gouging at them.

Dr. Iplier held down his hands and frantically called for help as the Author began seizing. Nurses and other doctors rushed as they took the young man back into the surgery room.

Too late to save his eyes.

(GAP)

In a private waiting room, Kay was waiting for news on Arthur.

To put it mildly, he was fucked.

Kay was horrified and terrified all in one go. What was he going to do? He’d panicked. Artie had been dying and he let the heroes just take him.

They’d found him with a gun and a fancy suit and Kay was so frazzled that he just confessed they were network members on the spot. So he’d been arrested, not formally but he was in a room with Abe and they were being nice.

Probably because he looked like a kid and was clearly so distraught that they weren’t getting much. He did have that nice stray dog next to him that was just letting the heroes’ apprentice pet him.

“Such a good boy,” Ethan scratched his ears. “You have such a nice dog.”

“He’s not mine, he’s a stray,” Kay corrected. “He is a good dog though.”

“But he’s such a good boy,” Ethan frowned, already deciding to keep him.

“He’s going to kill me,” Kay realized.

“Who?” Abe asked, his attention laser-focused on Kay.

“My,” Kay started, absolutely destroying his bottom lip with his teeth. He caught himself, having enough control over his racing panic for that. “Dark, he’s going to kill me.”

“And why’s that?” Abe asked.

Kay paused, feeling his heart beating so fast it felt like a hummingbird.

Ethan’s future dog whimpered and licked his hand, Kay reflexively began petting his head.

The young man was saved from answering when the room flew open, Dr. Iplier’s voice chasing him down the hall. “Sir, you need to get back to your room, you just got out of surgery.”

The man who’d burst into the room had a long brown trench and a floral print shirt. There were white bandages around his eyes that had blood already seeping through. “Everyone in the room freezes as the Host comes to a halt.”

Suddenly the room snapped to the Host’s command, and with just a few words Kay, Host, the dog, and the heroes were all in the living area of the hero’s base, going right through Marvin’s magical barrier and startling Chase who was in the room drinking a coffee.

Blood began seeping through the Host’s bandages with the force of moving everyone into the base.

With another few sentences he summonses Silver and Jackie into the base, saving both from running into a very angry Dark who was hunting for Jackie.

Chase and Abe pulled their weapons on the Host.

“Stop! Stop!” Abe ordered and the Host’s narrations died down to a mutter.

“No, stop talking, now!” Abe ordered.

“The Host is not capable of such an action, he narrates the world around him,” the Host told the heroes, the dog barking wildly at him as the apprentice hero tried to calm him down.

“Artie?” Kay realized. The voice was hauntingly familiar, but itched something dangerous into his brain. Whoever was in front of him was  _ not _ his brother. He was something else.

“The Author is dead,” the Host announced, “the Host was left behind.”

Kay felt a flood of surprise, grief, guilt, and disbelief, “What? No, he’s not dead.”

“You flatlined,” Iplier corrected sharply, having gotten over the shock of being suddenly teleported into the base. “We revived you.”

There was a slight smile on the Host’s face. “The Entity known as Dark will attempt to find and interrogate any heroes he sees in order to locate the two enforcers that went missing from his network an hour ago.”

“It’s been longer than an hour,” Dr. Iplier reminded.

“Has it, Doctor?” The Host smiled.

“Yeah it’s,” Dr. Iplier started, checking his watch, “holy shit, how is it only three?”

“The Silver Shepherd should call all the heroes to prepare them for the Entity’s attack, the instant he finds out that King and the Host are in the base, he will send Google to attack.”

That got the heroes to move into action, J.J bracing to fend off Dark when he finally arrived, full of fire and parental fury.

The Host would sit across the room from Kay who was a ball of grief, waiting.

Eventually Kay walked over and leaned against the Host. The Host letting him grieve, and slowly his words would erase the Actor’s poisonous words from Kay’s mind, freeing him from the implications of his reality falling apart around him.

An act that the Host would ensure he was never thanked or yelled at for it.

In a couple weeks, Kay would be sitting in the heroes’ base. He was unsure if he wanted to stay with the heroes or go back to his family. He felt lonely and isolated from everyone.

As if something had heard his call, a squirrel scurried into the room. Looking around for something before hopping into his lap and cuddling against him. By the end of the day the heroes would find seven squirrels buzzing around him. As it turned out, Kay was an animal magnet and he would gain a newfound determination.

Dark with all his money and power did nothing but watch the city rot. But there was beauty in the city and the heroes really weren’t all that bad.

So the new King of the Squirrels vowed to bring some life back into the city, even if Dark disowned and hated him for it. He would not let it die around him.

**Author's Note:**

> The hand that hits the Actor is mine. Look, he 100% deserves it. He’s a hard character to deal with.


End file.
